Akash Kapur

Akash Kapur is an Indian-American journalist and author. He is the author of a non-fiction book titled India Becoming, which was selected by The New Yorker and The New Republic as a Best Book of 2012;^[1][2] by Newsweek as one of its three Must Reads on Modern India;^[3] and by The New York Times Book Review as an "Editors' Choice."^[4] The book was short listed for the Shakti Bhatt Prize,^[5] and an episode from the book was excerpted in The New Yorker magazine.^[6] In 2018, Kapur was awarded a Whiting Nonfiction Grant for work on his upcoming book, titled Better to Have Gone (Scribner).^[7]

Early life and education[]

Kapur was born to an Indian father and American mother and raised near Auroville. He attended boarding school in the United States when he was sixteen.^[8] Kapur graduated summa cum laude from Harvard University with a major in Social Anthropology. He has a DPhil in Socio-Legal Studies from Oxford University (Nuffield College), which he attended as a Rhodes Scholar. He also attended the SAIIER (Sri Aurobindo International Institute of Educational Research) school in Auroville, where he grew up, and Phillips Academy, Andover.^[9]

Career[]

Writing and Journalism[]

Kapur has published in a variety of newspapers and magazines, including The Atlantic, The Economist, Granta, The New York Times, Outlook, The New Yorker, and Time magazine. He is the former "Letter from India" columnist for the International New York Times. In 2010, his columns for the New York Times received an "Honorable Mention" award by The Society of Publishers in Asia (SOPA), which praised Kapur's "brilliant accounts of developments in modern India."^[10] In Time magazine, Pico Iyer wrote that India Becoming was "impressively lucid and searching" and added that, "In his clarity, sympathy and impeccably sculpted prose, Kapur often summons the spirit of V.S. Naipaul."^[11]

In 2018, Kapur was awarded a Whiting Nonfiction Grant for his work on an upcoming book. The book, titled Better to Have Gone, is due to be published by Scribner. In its citation, the prize jury stated: "This book is a moving fusion of memoir, history, and ethnography that will inject new life into these forms. As an investigation into an unsolved mystery, it is compelling; as a meditation on the promise and the limitations of utopianism, it could have global resonance. The writing is unornamented, plangent, and affecting. By evoking the everyday in precise detail, Kapur brings utopianism as lived practice to technicolor life. In attempting to locate the shifting border between extremism and idealism, he has written a book rooted in memory but in dialogue with the present day."^[12]

Kapur has spoken several times on NPR radio in America,^[13][14][15] public radio in Australia,^[16] and NDTV in India.^[17] Kapur speaks fluent French, and has also spoken on several radio and TV programs in France, including on France 24, ^[18] France Inter,^[19] and Radio France Internationale.^[20] India Becoming was published in France in mid-2014, under the title L'Inde de Demain (Albin Michel).^[21]

In addition to writing on India, Kapur has also written on a variety of other issues. His travel writing has appeared in Condé Nast Traveller and The Atlantic, and includes reports from Romania,^[22][23] Poland,^[24] Turkey ^[25] Switzerland,^[26] and Thailand.^[27]

Auroville, and utopia[]

Articles, column, anthology, interview

Kapur grew up in the utopian community of Auroville and his writing has increasingly addressed the topic of utopia and the search for alternatives. In an article in The New Yorker magazine titled "The Return of the Utopians," he has expressed skepticism about the potential of lasting change being achieved through utopian movements, calling instead for a focus on incrementalism and "meliorism."^[28] However, in an article from The Financial Times on the possibility of achieving a universal basic income, he expresses a less skeptical approach, citing utopia's value as a means of diagnosing the ills of society.^[29]

Kapur is reported to be working on a narrative book about utopia set in Auroville. In 2018, he published a collected anthology of writings from Auroville, titled Auroville: Dream and Reality, which examines the utopian ambition and its realization in the community.^[30] The book's publication coincided with Auroville's fiftieth anniversary. In an interview about the book with Conde Nast Traveller, Kapur writes of his increased interest and faith in the idealism associated with utopia.^[31] In an interview for The Indian Express, he says that: "Appreciating Auroville requires a certain duality in perspective. It means recognising and cherishing the ideals, while at the same time recognising that the city as it exists today."^[32]

2021 book

His own book on Auroville Better to Have Gone was published in 2021. A mix of genres, it starts as a standard non-fiction narrative, but becomes increasingly augmented by relevant remarks and reflections of an autobiographical nature. Auroville's uniqueness and spirit, controversial struggles, dramatic events, and current status are presented chronologically, in an easy journalistic style. Portraits of key community figures, e.g., Sri Aurobindo Ghose (1872–1950), Mirra Alfassa [the Mother] (1878–1973), Satprem (1923–2007), and Amrit (born 1943), are drawn. Lives of residents are followed, especially in detail two well-known Aurovilians: his wife's mother Diane Maes (1950–1986), and her partner John Walker (1942–1986). Kapur himself and his wife Auralice Graft (born 1972) are interested participants. Occasional poetic passages contribute nuance and seasoning to the text. John's letters also are quoted many times.^[33][34][35]

Technology and Society[]

Kapur's PhD thesis at Oxford focused on the effects of new technologies on economic and social development. He has consulted for a variety of organizations on related topics, including the United Nations Development Program and The Markle Foundation.^[36] Recently, he was named a non-residential Senior Fellow at The GovLab,^[37] New York University, an organization that explores the intersection of technology and governance.^[38] He is also a member of the Academic Council of Krea University, a new university in India that seeks to reimagine liberal arts for the twenty first century.

References[]

External links[]

• Official website
• Akash Kapur at Penguin India